Department News

Articles about activities within the academic departments

Marketing News and Notes

Posted on by Melissa Ferrigno

Adam B. Camara ’03 is the co-founder of the national internet marketing firm, Network for Solutions.

Betsey B. Gainey ’97 is the 2014 winner of Hartford Business Journal’s 40 under 40. Gainey is currently the vice president and director of client services at Cronin and Company, the largest full-service independent marketing communications agency in Connecticut.

Gregg B. Schuster ’05 MBA will resign as the First Selectman in Colchester, Connecticut to take on the challenge of managing a town in transition in Pocono Township, Pennsylvania.

Rita J. Ugianskis-Fishman ’88, ’95 MBA has been named vice president and general manager of The ASI Show. Ugianskis-Fishman was most recently managing director of Penton’s Waste Industry Group and is an accomplished trade show executive.

“Display: Marketing as Art” – A Collaboration with the School of Fine Arts

Posted on by Melissa Ferrigno

Marketing as Art Photo, Contemporary Art Galleries

“Display: Marketing as Art,” an exhibition at the Contemporary Art Galleries in Spring 2014, featured the works of artists Martin Basher of New Zealand, Gabriele Beveridge of London, Dike Blair of New York, Josephine Meckseper of Germany, and Mika Tajima of Los Angeles. Barry Rosenberg, curator of CAG, transformed the gallery into an open space revealing the glass windows along the street-side of the gallery, “I wanted to take advantage of the reflected image, recreating retail space,” Rosenberg says. “Each use sculpture or work of art individually, but also together. The floor is painted red. It’s all about high-end design and product.” The artists’ works offered a fresh look at Marshall McLuhan’s “the medium is the message” and illustrate, engage, and challenge the visual language of commercialism.

On April 14, 2014, Barry Rosenberg hosted a symposium with Martin Basher, Dike Blair, and Mika Tajima presenting their work and Robin Coulter, professor of marketing, sharing observations of art, commercialization, and marketing. The Marketing Department was a sponsor of the exhibition.

‘Paradise Sale,’ a work by Martin Basher of New Zealand, is a mixed media work that includes Plexiglas, aluminum, and fluorescent lights. Located outdoors, at night it reveals a painting of a sunset beach.

Professors Gilson, Mathieu Win Best Paper Awards

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Faculty and Ph.D. students in the School of Business’ management department have been selected for two prestigious awards in recent weeks.

Gilson, MathieuThe Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology (JOOP) recently recognized a paper titled “Unpacking the Cross-level Effects of Tenure Diversity, Explicit Knowledge, and Knowledge Sharing on Individual Creativity,” as Best Paper for 2013. The paper was co-authored by UConn graduate students Margaret Luciano and Hyoun Sook Lim and Professor of Management Lucy Gilson. Continue Reading

School of Business Welcomes 14 New Faculty Members for Fall 2014

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The UConn School of Business has welcomed 14 new faculty members to its ranks this fall. “It was a very competitive year,” said Dean John A. Elliott. “We were able to hire a diverse group of women and men, including experienced faculty members and newer Ph.D. graduates. We have some senior educators, and some junior; all are excellent.”

View new faculty profiles here.

David Bergman Receives Prestigious Association for Constraint Programming Doctoral Thesis Award

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David BergmanDavid Bergman, an assistant professor of Operations and Information Management in the School of Business, has been selected as the winner of this year’s Association for Constraint Programming Doctoral Thesis Award.
The annual award is given to a researcher who has completed his/her thesis in the area of constraint programming. Bergman will present his thesis at this year’s 20th International Conference on Principles and Practices of Constraint Programming in Lyon, France, in September.

Bergman’s thesis is titled, “New Techniques for Discrete Optimization,” and it explores new methodological approaches to discrete optimization problems, an area of operations research which finds an increasing number of applications in fields such as finance, healthcare, and logistics, to name just a few. His thesis provides both theoretical insights and important algorithmic discoveries which together improve upon existing state-of-the-art technology.

He completed his Ph.D. in 2013 at Carnegie Mellon University in Algorithms, Combinatorics, and Optimization, a joint program administered by the Tepper School of Business, the Department of Mathematical Sciences, and the Computer Science Department. Bergman’s thesis advisors were John N. Hooker and Willem-Jan van Hoeve.

An abstract of “New Techniques for Discrete Optimization” is available here.

12th Annual Real Estate Center Awards Banquet

Posted on by Brian Kelleher

(5/8/2014) – The 12th Annual Real Estate Awards Banquet was held at the South Campus Ballroom on Thursday, May 1. The special occasion recognized outstanding students, alumni, and scholarship recipients.

The following alumni and students were recognized for their achievements:

Lifetime Achievement Award: Daniel Ferraina, Ferraina Companies

Distinguished Alumni: Michael Riccio, CB-Richard Ellis Capital Markets

Alumni of the Year: Bradford Wainman, Simon Konover Development Corp.

Early Career Alumni: Kelsey Rath, Talcott Realty Investors, LLC

Organizational Partner: Greater New Haven Association of Realtors

Excellence in Research: Professor Carmelo Giaccotto and Professor Thomas Miceli

Students of the Year: Frances (Frankie) Gibbons and Andrew Kelly

Other student award recipients included: Nicolas Chapman, Tyler Cormier, Julia Dumaine, Andrew Harney, Scott Howard, M. Connor Lyman, Matthew McCandless, Cole McQuilken, Johncarlo Morales, Benjamin Napoli, Bridget O’Malley, Laura O’Malley, Ryan Powers, Peter Rodriguez, Colby Schaefer, Austin Smyth, Melissa Touger, Kristine Victor, and Hui Zhang.

IBM Partners with UConn, Other Institutions to Prepare Students for Big Data Jobs

Posted on by Brian Kelleher

(6/12/2014) – 4.4 million jobs will be created worldwide to support big data by 2015, according to a Gartner press release on key issues facing the IT industry.

To prepare students for big data careers, the UConn School of Business offers graduate and undergraduate degree programs in business analytics that focus on data management, analytics, and using emerging technologies to better manage financial risk and other business needs.Continue Reading

Strong Corporate Support for Students in UConn Stamford’s New Financial Management Major

Posted on by Brian Kelleher

(6/30/2014) – The UConn School of Business is proud to announce a premier group of financial institutions supporting the School’s new undergraduate Financial Management major in Stamford.

The Financial Management major was designed and developed, in part, by CFA charterholders from prominent local hedge funds and investment firms. The major has been accepted into the CFA Institute’s University Recognition Program and stands to serve as inspiration to a program intent on helping cultivate a young generation of future CFA charterholders. The CFA credential has become one of the most globally respected designations and the Financial Management major, along with those selected within this program to join the Investment Management Program (IMP), will be exposed to academic and practical applications in finance coupled with reinforcement of strong ethical behavior.

“Through a progressive relationship with the CFA Society of Stamford, students who excel in the Financial Management major will be invited to join an exclusive Investment Management Program (IMP), which, among other benefits, provides access to a wide array of tools and research from financial institutions like Barclays, CreditSights, and Atlantic Asset Management,” said Jud Saviskas, executive director for the UConn School of Business in Stamford. “This innovative relationship encourages and facilitates an exchange of ideas, networking opportunities and career development for aspiring investment professionals – and it’s already received outside interest from many other colleges and universities.”

Last year, a group of IMP students travelled to Wall Street for a visit to several institutions such as Barclays, Bloomberg, and CreditSights. As program supporters, these companies allow students and faculty complimentary access to their client web portals such as, Barclays Live, which provides a range of research and financial analytics tools, and CreditSights’ online global research platform and an analytical staff of almost 80 investment professionals.

“Barclay’s and CreditSights’ web portals are an excellent tool for IMP students as they undertake the challenges of the program and the pursuit of the CFA Level I exam,” said Michael Dineen, senior vice president of Atlantic Asset Management and UConn adjunct professor.

Thomas Walsh, managing director at Barclays added that the collaboration with IMP is just one example of the importance the bank places on developing an early foundation of ethical investment knowledge. “The most successful students will be those who develop the skill sets they need to be productive and innovative members of the next generation’s workforce,” Walsh said. “We are delighted to be able to make Barclays Live available to IMP students and hope that they will derive significant benefit from these new resources.”

“We have had the pleasure to meet a number of IMP students, and they are coming into the space during interesting times in the evolution of the credit markets,” said Glenn Reynolds, CEO of CreditSights. “We hope the background information from prior credit cycles and our analysis of the structural shifts taking place today – most notably in banking and finance – can be of value as they prepare themselves for the role they can play in the markets. Credit has grown dramatically in all areas of the global economy from sovereign to corporate to household, and there are a lot of moving parts to the puzzle.”

Fiserv Collaborates with UConn School of Business on Next-Generation Banking Apps

Posted on by Brian Kelleher

fiservBrookfield, Wis. and Hartford, Conn. (5/27/2014) – Fiserv, Inc. (NASDAQ: FISV), a leading global provider of financial services technology solutions, and the University of Connecticut School of Business, one of the top public business schools in the nation, today announced that Fiserv is participating in the university’s Financial Accelerator Program to help educate students and foster innovation.

The Financial Accelerator Program was established in 2002 to create opportunities for UConn students and faculty to apply classroom concepts to real business challenges. With the Fiserv initiative, UConn MBA students are collaborating with area business leaders from Fiserv and two of its clients, the Savings Bank of Danbury and Greylock Federal Credit Union, to explore how financial institutions can attract and serve Gen Y consumers using state-of-the-art banking technology.

“The Financial Accelerator Program at the University of Connecticut School of Business shines a spotlight on the exciting and innovative career opportunities available to students in the state,” said Connecticut Governor, Dannel P. Malloy. “Collaborations like this, which bring the leaders of tomorrow together with the leaders of today, foster the innovation and opportunity that help make Connecticut such an attractive place to live and work.”

The initiative, currently underway for the Spring 2014 semester, introduces UConn MBA students to the DNATM account account processing platform from Fiserv. DNA is a modern, enterprise-wide software platform relied upon by Savings Bank of Danbury and Greylock FCU as well as hundreds of other banks and credit unions for transaction processing, data management and customer relationship management. DNA offers a unique development toolkit – DNAcreatorTM – that allows users to create seamlessly integrated applications called DNAappsTM that extend the platform in new and powerful ways. At the conclusion of the Financial Accelerator Program, UConn students will present a business case for a new DNAapp that DNA users like Savings Bank of Danbury and Greylock FCU can use to enhance the millennial banking experience.

“DNA from Fiserv incorporates the latest industry standard tools and languages currently being taught at UConn and other leading universities where banks and credit unions can find a deep and talented pool of software engineers,” said Steve Cameron, president, Open Solutions Division, Fiserv. “By partnering with some of our region’s brightest minds at UConn, the Savings Bank of Danbury and Greylock Federal Credit Union, Fiserv is investing in the local community and continuing to build on our vision to drive the global digital transformation of financial services.”

The students will work with Savings Bank of Danbury, Greylock FCU and Fiserv associates throughout the program to ensure their proposal is both viable and compelling. After completing their research, idea development and return on investment (ROI) analysis, the students will present their findings to Fiserv associates at the end of the semester. The program may be extended into the Fall semester with a new group of students to execute the business plan using DNAcreator to build the proposed DNAapp.

“The DNA platform from Fiserv fits nicely with UConn’s goal of fostering an entrepreneurial ecosystem within our state,” said Jeffrey Scarella, Industry Liaison, Physical Sciences & Engineering at the UConn Office of Economic Development. “By leveraging the intellectual power of our students and faculty, we hope to help community institutions like the Savings Bank of Danbury and Greylock Federal Credit Union, as well as leading financial innovators like Fiserv, provide the best possible banking experience to the next generation of Connecticut consumers.”

“This collaboration allows our students to use the knowledge, research skills, innovative thinking, and work ethic they’re acquiring at UConn in a very welcoming business environment provided by Fiserv,” said UConn Professor Michel Rakotomavo, faculty advisor for the project. “They have invaluable access to and interactions with executives from the partnering organizations and benefit from those organizations’ resources and information, making the experience truly distinctive in higher education.”

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